Stop Elephant abuse in the name of Religion

Every signature matters .. it makes a difference and it is the only way to change the current situation.

These are living beings we are talking about.. beings who not only need the physical space of vast forests by their very nature but also are known to form strong bonds within their herds, their 'families'.

To separate them from their families and make a mockery of these gentle giants on the name of religion is not only shameless but brutal as well. We may never see the act as that of cruelty on the face of it, but beneath the ornamented surface, lies the heartbreaking truth of the life of a temple elephant.

This is to urge the millions who fail to realise the torture these gentle giants face because of our ignorance and to the authorities to take action against the cruelty inflicted in the name of religion.

Temple elephants are in reality no different than captive elephants.

It is estimated that the southern state of Kerala alone has over 500 temple elephants.

These sentient and social animals are usually not provided with proper veterinary care and are kept chained and alone surrounded by the urban noise and crowds.

They suffer from heat exhaustion and foot diseases that literally wear away the bottoms of the feet from standing on the hard stone flooring of temples.

The elephant trainer or mahout is not required to have any formal education in animal care and training methods typically involve the systematic use of physical pain to establish dominance. These abused and neglected elephants are exploited for the primary purpose of making money for their owners.

o The elephants are supposed to be given bath regularly, in flowing clean water, but rarely this happens and most of the time the bath takes place in stagnant pools!

o The elephants are usually ill fed and chained for long hours.

o The incident which happened at a temple in kottayam in the year 1990, was one of the worst of its kind!The nearby residents had heard the elephant crying in the night, but could not even imagine that a cruelty of that sort was happening there. (as read at http://stopelephantabuseinkerala.blogspot.in/)

o One important factor is that elephant needs a variety of green fodder available usually in the jungle, but the captive elephants are just fed palm leaves!

"I can categorically say that elephants should not be conﬁned in captivity, no matter how attractive the facilities may appear to be. These are animals that mirror humans in terms of emotion, age, progression and longevity, and above all, they need their family, their friends and space. No artiﬁcial situation can give an elephant what it needs in terms of space, for 100 miles is a mere stroll for these animals. "

~Dr. Daphne Sheldrick, DVM , UNEP Glo

The picture here is of a captive elephant's foot.

The daily accumulation of damage from standing and walking on ﬂat concrete ﬂoors tends to cause joint injury and predisposes the elephant’s feet to infection from abnormal wear.

As the joints and feet become progressively injured by life spent on a concrete ﬂoor, the pain the elephants feel make them reluctant to move around as much on their sore legs and feet.

This creates a vicious circle and downward spiral of pain, followed by less movement, causing further injury, causing more pain, causing even less movement, etc. It is a slow gradual process that does its damage bit-by-bit and this damage continues hourly, daily, weekly, monthly and through the long decades of a captive elephant’s life.

Our aim is the abolishment of using elephants for religious at various religious places and purposes like processions.

God made every living being equal and these beautiful animals deserve a life in their natural habitat and have done nothing to deserve a life of imprisonment to be shackled or begging in the name of religion.